For Whom the Bell Tolls
by Soul Reaver
Summary: Takes place within the Guns of October Story arc, almost a year before the events of Every Clime and Place. Ivy loses a friend she romantically rejected three years ago...


For Whom the Bell Tolls  
  
Disclaimer: I do not own the Where on Earth is Carmen Sandiego franchise. This story I just thought of on the spur of the moment. It takes place sometime between Guns of October and Every Clime and Place and it was inspired by my own girl problems so I wrote this on the spur of the moment. For me writing is a healing for anything that life has thrown my way.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~  
  
20 November 2142  
  
Ms. Ivy Darren,  
  
The Department Defense regrets to inform you that Damage Controlman 2nd Class Martin Nace, United Systems Navy was killed in action on this day 20 November 2142....  
  
Ivy Darren couldn't read the rest of the telegram through tear stained eyes that clouded her vision. She couldn't believe the embossed Department of Defense telegram in front of her, yet the words were so entirely damning. Martin Nace, a Damage Controlman 2nd Class, was killed in action very on that date on the telegram. What was most damning to her was that she had killed him, very slowly, three years earlier.  
  
The words of that day, three years ago, when she had been eighteen came back to haunt her. "Martin, I'm sorry, that won't work, I'm kind of seeing somebody right now..."  
  
It had been three years ago, Martin had only been in the Navy for two years then as a reservist. It happened after he finished a training exercise with River Patrol Squadron 3 in South America. She remembered she was in her living room that day, walking out to the gym when the phone rang.  
  
"Hi, is Ivy there? It's me, Martin." came the voice.  
  
"This is Ivy."  
  
They made small talk for a while before Ivy said, "I'd hate to cut this short, but I'm on my way to they gym to go work out."  
  
They often had lengthy phone conversations where they discussed many things, ranging from their views of politics, to current events, to just life in general. Martin had always considered her a good friend.  
  
"When would be a good time to call back?" Martin asked.  
  
"Not anytime tonight because I'm going out to dinner with my family." Ivy replied.  
  
"Well I'll make this quick. Could some time in these three weeks I have off I could interest you in a movie." Martin replied.  
  
"Martin, I'm sorry, that won't work. I'm kinda seeing someone right now." Ivy replied. She was referring to her recently renewed relationship with Marco.  
  
"Oh, OK. Good luck." Martin said and clumsily hung up.  
  
For the next three weeks, Martin acted as if he was unaffected, but Ivy knew her words upset him. She knew just how badly when she saw him moving his stuff into the back of his Honda Civic. "I have to go away for a while Ivy. There's something I feel I have to do right now. I'm not sure when, if ever I'm coming back."  
  
Martin looked like a repentant criminal about to be hanged upon the gallows. It was when she went back to her office that she found a sheet on it. They were orders for Martin to report to active duty at Naval Amphibious Base, Coronado, California to class up with Class 163 of the US Navy Scouts and Raiders training unit.  
  
She heard nay a word from Martin for nearly three years since then. He was always off somewhere in the world performing some dangerous clandestine mission or training to execute one such mission. And when the Biohazard hit Earth in 2141, she began following the news broadcasts with great interest because several people she knew, and not just Martin, were involved in this war either caught up in the Biohazard's onslaught or fighting against it. She read the casualty report in the paper every morning, constantly relieved when she didn't see his name.  
  
She knew Nace was an orphan and had found his true home at ACME and later the Navy Reserve to support his schooling. She befriended him on his first day and since then he saw her as a close friend. Ivy didn't know when exactly the lonely orphan had fallen in love with her, but she knew her rejection hurt him, as evidenced by his rarer letters home. She knew his last unit was Naval Scouts and Raiders Group 3 (NSRG 3), fighting in the South Pacific. Ivy could only imagine the angst and pain he felt as his perceived door to the love and affection life as an orphan had denied him had closed. She could only see that he was hurting and refused to be reached.  
  
Then this day in 2142 came along, DC2 Martin Nace, USN, NSRG 3, KIA. That single line in the newspaper confirmed the telegram she held in her hand. Suddenly the phone rang and Ivy picked it up.  
  
"Hello." Ivy replied.  
  
"Good afternoon, is Ms. Ivy Darren available." Said a voice on the other side.  
  
"This is she." Ivy replied.  
  
"This is Senior Chief Gardener, from Coronado, California. I believe you are listed as the primary beneficiary of one Petty Officer 2nd Class Martin Nace. His personal effects are waiting to be cleared out."  
  
"Thank you." Ivy replied weakly.  
  
She tapped the button on her communicator and took a C-5 corridor to San Diego, California. After being given directions to the lonely room in the NSRG 3 Barracks she began to sort through the drawers and closets. She had witnessed a similar event four years earlier when they were emptying a room that had belonged to Martin's next door neighbor, a petty officer killed in an accidental engine room explosion aboard the USS Tsunami (PC-17), a patrol craft that was operating off the coast of Australia.  
  
She could see that the yeomen had gotten there first and saw the detrius of Martin's life laid bare across his spare framed bed. There were two sets of folded camouflage utilities. She picked up a blouse gingerly, as if Martin's spirit still resided in the room. The nametag read Nace and the other patch read US Navy. She had seen three piled dixie covers, a sailor's traditional cap. At least three command ballcaps, baseball hats emblazoned with the commands that Martin had served under, were also atop the bed. A sailor's neckerchief was also slung onto the bed post. She picked up a small pocket knife from the mattress with the initials MN carved into it.  
  
"Ma'am?" came a voice from just outside the door.  
  
Ivy turned to find a solitary sailor, his leg encased in a plaster cast, standing on crutches, "I'm Seaman Katzinsky, do you need help?"  
  
"I'm fine, thanks." Ivy replied, turning around.  
  
"Ma'am." The sailor insisted, he was still there even after five minutes, "He saved my life."  
  
Ivy felt a jolt run through her as the sailor continued, "I was there with him on Tarawa when we landed to recon the beach for the invasion. We came under attack by an enemy patrol and had to break contact. I was hit on the way out and the next thing I see is Martin running to my side, dragging me across the beach, shooting as he ran. The next thing I heard as we got to the surf line was him shouting that he was hit. I shouted for the corpsman and he ran over there and shook his head. The hole in his side was big, he was losing blood fast. I could see him blinking in shock and the next thing I knew he was dead."  
  
The sailor hobbled up to her and pressed something into her hand, "I took these from him right after, and I knew I couldn't keep them. He used to say you were the only family he'd ever had outside of the Navy and since I can't keep these, I figured he'd have wanted you to have them."  
  
Ivy looked at the item pressed into her hand, it was a set of dog tags, scotched taped together and missing one of the rubber o-ring silencers with a tiny pewter crucifix taped to it. They were Martin's dog tags.  
  
Ivy walked out of the barracks, watching two sailors loading Martin's remaining gear into her car and slid the dog tags around her neck. She wore them to remember one sailor that would never return from the Pacific theater. 


End file.
